Though traced back to the 15th century, this opening came into prominence in the middle of the 19th century. Since then, it has remained ever popular and is frequently seen in tournaments. It takes its name from a Spanish clergyman of the 16th century Ruy Lopez who made a systematic analysis of this opening. The basic ideas are easy to understand and the strategic and tactical possibilities appeal to players’ imaginations, giving rise to a large number of variations. New ideas or modifications of old ones keep coming up and these have helped to retain interest in this opening.

The present discussion, though made with reference to Ruy Lopez because of its wide prevalence, is to show you how you can analyze openings to understand the issues involved. An introduction to Ruy Lopez was given earlier, this description takes it a little more forward and shows the moves step by step that may appeal to the very beginners.

The diagrams on the left show the main line of play. Those on the right, when they appear, show the possibilities after the last main move.

This tries to wrest control of e5 by attacking the black pawn and exerts control on d4

2. … Nc6

This defends the e5 pawn and holds on to its share of control of the center and challenges White’s control on d4

3. Bb5

The starting of Ruy Lopez. This indirectly tries to seize control of center by attacking the defender knight of the e5 pawn. If this Knight is removed, White will be able to capture Black’s e5 pawn

This move also indirectly prevents Black to move his QP (which would help Black to support his KP and free the line for his QB) because the Knight will be pinned against the King.

3. … a6

This move is known as Morphy Defense, apparently ignoring White’s threat. After this move, Ruy Lopez variations get into two broad categories, one with 3. … a6 and the other without this move.

This move tries to drive White’s KB away, preparing the way for b5 at some stage that will force the Bishop to abandon its attack on black QN. But such pawn moves create some weakness in Black’s pawn structure while retaining his hold on his KP.

4. Ba4

The Bishop retreats while still retaining its attack on the Knight.

You may ask: why not capture the Knight after what was said at move 3?This is because of the following possibilities.

4. Bxc6

If the Bishop captures the Knight …

4. … dxc6

… the QP captures the Bishop …

5. Nxe5

White Knight captures Blacks KP …

5. … Qd4

… Black Q attacks both the White Knight and Pawn at e4 and in trying to save the Knight, White has to surrender his e4 pawn and its control of the center. Black may have got doubled pawn on c-file but retains the advantage of having both Bishops.

Black has another alternative also …

5. … Qg5

… Black Q attacks both the Knight and g-pawn and thus gets compensation for the loss of his KP.

So White’s immediate capture of Knight with Bishop at move 4 does not give any benefit but it can be done after his KP is supported. Black has to watch out for such moves by White.

4. … Nf6

Secure in the knowledge of above possibilities, Black is not worried about his KP for the present and tries to make a counter-attack on White’s KP to wrest control of center.

5. 0-0

It is now White’s turn to disregard Black’s threat and proceed with castling to secure his King’s position and bringing KR into play.

Why is the threat not considered? The following possibilities show that.

5. … Nxe4

If Black Knight captures the KP …

6. Re1

… The Rook attacks the Knight and captures Black’s KP when the Knight moves away.

Alternatively …

6. d4

… White’s QP directly attacks Black’s KP …

6. … exd4

… if Black tries to capture White’s d-pawn …

7. Re1

… White Rook pins the Knight against Black King

5. … Be7

Being aware of above complications, Black places a guard in front of the King which also develops the Bishop and opens the line for castling.

6. Re1

This provides support to the KP and thereby reinstates the initial threat of Bxc6 posed at move 3. At this time, White had three other options to support his KP viz. …

6. Qe2

… support by the Queen …

6. Nc3

… support by the QN …

6. d3

… support by the QP

6. … b5

Black is aware of the revival of the threat against his Knight at c3 and thereby on his KP, so he parries the threat by attacking the Bishop

7. Bb3

The Bishop has to retreat but now has a line to Black’s vulnerable f7 square

7. … d6

The e5 pawn is supported further and lines have been opened for developing QB

Black has the option of castling now and playing d6 on the next move.

This is the main line of Ruy Lopez Closed Defense, Classical Variation. It can be seen that Black’s 3. … a6 is instrumental in maintaining his e5 pawn and so long as Black is able to hold on to his KP and thereby a control on the center, his position is satisfactory. If the KP gets exchanged, strategic advantages accrue to White.

You can see that even within a span of 7 moves, so many different possibilities may arise including the strategic and tactical considerations that come into play. Any opening that you plan to follow should be analyzed this way to find the inherent strategies with positive and negative aspects. Your play should be consistent with the strategies to get the maximum benefits till you reach the middle game when you are on your own.

This blocking move takes away Black’s options and puts him under zugzwang!

2.

…

Rf1

3.

Rxe2

Rf3

4.

Rd2+

Kc8

5.

Rd5

Kc7

6.

Rf5

Re3+

7.

Kf6

The Pawn will promote on next move.

We now give you an example from actual play that took place in a 1953 Danish tournament between A. Kupferstich and J. Andreassen.

Nothing much could be found about A. Kupferstich except that he was part of Danish team in 9th Chess Olympiad held at Dubrovnik in 1950 and also represented Denmark in several friendly matches during 1947-1955. Except that J. Andreassen was a player from Denmark, I could find nothing more about him.

The diagram shows the position after 20 moves.

Though White has an extra Knight, he has four pawns less and his Kingside pawns are isolated. His Rook is under attack and it is natural to expect him to play 21. Rg1 after which Black would play 21. … Bc6 protecting his weak c7 pawn. But White possibly felt that he would have a much better attacking prospect with his Knight and Bishop close to enemy King if he could position his Rook on the 7th rank by capturing the c7 pawn instead of trying to protect his Rook at h1!

This is how the game rolled on.

21.

Rxc7!

Bxh1

22.

Nxf7

Bd5

Black tried to guard f7 square because of 23. Nxd6+ Kf8 24. Rf7#

23.

Nxd6+

Kf8

24.

Bg5

Rh8

Black tried to create an escape hole against 25. Bh6+ with mate to follow.

25.

Bh6+

Kg8

26.

Rg7+

Kf8

27.

Rc7+

Kg8

Poor Black King had no other go! White could have reduced his agony somewhat by playing 27. Rxb7+ straightaway, unless he was running slow on his clock!

All these moves can be taken as a demonstration of the power of discovered checks!

33.

Rxa8

Bxa8

34.

Nd6!

Resigns

The ‘zugzwang’ move!

The Knight and Bishop totally immobilizes the Black King and Rook. Black has to helplessly wait for an execution by a final Knight check at e7 or f6.

Even in this position, the game holds interest as White’s task is not easy. He still has to deliver checkmate as stated above but cannot afford to move the Knight till his King is positioned at e6 or f6 or e7 to prevent Black King’s escape when the Knight is moved.

Black’s strategy will be to push his pawns forward till those get captured at e3 and g3. Then he will use the Bishop to prevent White from carrying out his Knight maneuver and also try to capture both White pawns if they try for promotion. If White captures the Bishop, Black can claim stalemate.

What should White do? He should capture Black’s e- and g-pawns and move his King to e6 or f6 or e7. The Knight can then deliver check via (e4-f6 or e8-f6) or (c8-e7 or f5-e7).

Black knows that if White King is at e7, only (e4-f6 or e8-f6) is possible for Knight and Bishop positioned at c6 blocks these moves. If White King is f6, only (c8-e7 or f5-e7) is available to the Knight and Bishop can go to any square on c8-h3 diagonal to block those. Only if the King is at e6, all four options become available, but Bishop can check from d7 or d5 (remember that the Bishop is taboo!) to force White King to f6 or e7.

Assume that White King has reached f6. The Bishop has to be at d7 to guard c8 and f5 and to keep eye on White pawns. So White keeps pushing one of the pawns forcing the Bishop to leave its post to capture the pawn which otherwise gets promoted. The Knight can then move to c8 or f5 to deliver checkmate on next move.

It is possible to win even if White did not have those pawns, but that is another story!

No discussion on zugzwang is complete without reference to “The Immortal Zugzwang Game” between Friedrich Samisch and Aron Nimzowitsch played at Copenhagen in 1923. You have to play it yourself to see its beauty.

Though I said ‘some’ but actually I meant one that goes under a German name and seems to have been in use in German chess literature since since early ninteenth century. It is supposed to have been introduced in English chess literature in early twentieth century by Emanuel Lasker, himself a German!

The word I have in mind is zugzwang. I understand that ‘zug’ means move and ‘zwang’ means ‘compulsion’, so the combined word means ‘compulsion to move’. Essentially, a player is said to be under zugzwang when any move that he makes will make his position worse and not to move would be the best move. But chess rules do not permit a player to skip move and the affected player under compulsion to move is committing a kind of ‘suicide’ by his move! Are you getting my point now? Suicide goes against the laws in most countries of the world and forcing another man to commit it is still more heinous! Shouldn’t therefore be a law against zugzwang (and wouldn’t the victims agree)?

Enough of chatter, can we see some example you will say. Though this is a potent weapon in chess endgames, it can occur at any time.

We first see an endgame problem that, though a very simple one, teaches you what zugzwang is and was created by French composer Henri Rinck (1870-1952) who was arguably the World’s Greatest Composer of chess problems.

White has to play and win in the position shown. The moves are:

1.

Rc7+

Rd7

2.

Qc5+

Kd8

2. … Ke6 3. Qf5+ loses the Rook

3.

Kh6

Black has the move and he is in zugzwang as any move makes him lose. Let us see what some of his options are:

Black Queen cannot deliver any viable check and trying to remain in contact with c8 square only enables its capture by White. If it loses contact with c8 square, White plays 4. Rc8#.

There are many other options available to Black and we have left it to you to find how the correct move (very important) by White in all the situations result in his winning the Black Rook or Queen or both, or delivering checkmate to the King.

You will notice that putting opponent in zugzwang is preceded by an idle (sometimes blocking) move by the attacker that forces the defender’s hand. In above example, 3. Kh6 was such a move.

Now that you have seen a simple one, here is another problem which is slightly more complex. This is a very old problem but quite instructive as similar position may arise in one of your endgames also. White is to play and win.

With two isolated pawns against three connected pawns, White may appear to be at a disadvantage but White’s winning line is as follows:

1.

a6

Kb8

Black King had to move to prevent 2. c7

2.

Kg1

f3

The idle move Kg1 to wait and watch is the only move that wins for White by creating zugzwang on Black

3.

Kf2

White’s strategy is simple: move the King to face whichever Black Pawn has advanced. Once that Pawn gets blocked, Black has to move another Pawn. In the meanwhile, Black King cannot move either way without allowing the other White Pawn to promote! You may try with other Pawn moves to verify the tactics.

3.

…

h3

4.

Kg3

h2

5.

Kxh2

f2

6.

Kg2

g3

7.

Kf1

7.

…

g2+

8.

Kxf2

g1=Q+

9.

Kxg1

Kc7

With no more pawn to move, Black King is forced to take the move it was trying to avoid.

10.

a7

Kxc6

11.

a8=Q+

White wins.

Because of its unusual nature, it is a popular theme for chess compositions and Susan Polgar’s blog of July 1 has a problem on this topic.

We have discussed at length about basic chess endings with Rook and Pawn as also some special techniques for handling a few typical situations. We also said that with Rooks present, a majority of one or two pawns often do not yield much benefit and such chess endgames are more likely to result in a draw, especially if the pawns are on the same side with their Kings close at hand.

But that is only a general observation. In this article we go through the lengthy process of playing through such a situation where White thought that exact play could give him a win with his single pawn majority if he could get a passed and protected KP.

At first sight, there does not seem to be much prospect of a win for White, so let us see what exactly was in his mind! We can of course see that White King cannot advance now without losing the BP.

1.

Rb6

Ra2

White’s move blocked Black King’s support to his KBP.

2.

Rd6

Rb2

Black is shuttling his Rook on rank 2 as ‘wait and watch’ policy while preventing White King from moving forward

In the article suggesting the best way to learn endgame tactics, we laid more stress on endgame plays by top players than on chess problems and chess studies. But at the same time, we pointed out that some of these problems and studies could benefit you in developing ideas on some finer endgame tactics like “underpromotion”, gaining tempo etc., some of which may appear in the same problem or study.

Here we will show you some creative ideas that can stand you in good stead in your actual endgame plays.

In this study by Moravec, White is required to play and win. To decide on your tactics, you should analyze as follows:

Even with the first move applied to White K to chase the Black RP, it will remain two moves outside ‘the Square’ for that pawn. So if Black continues to push RP, White K will only be on rank 3 when RP reaches h1 to get promoted.

If White so wants, his K can capture the Black NP in its stride towards the RP

When White K reaches g3 (after Black RP has reached h1 to become a Queen), Black on his next move cannot deliver a check by his Q with support from his K because of the White R controlling rank 2. Black thus loses a tempo!

White on the next move can deliver check by Ra1 and because of his K on g3, will cause checkmate! If on the previous move, Black tried Kf1, then check by Rook will result in his loss of Q!

At step 3, Black Q could go to h8 to control a1-h8 diagonal and the square a1 preventing Rook’s check (and thus retaining the tempo) – provided there were no Black P on g7 blocking that diagonal!

The conclusion is: White K must not capture the NP at step 2 so as to deny Black any tempo after pawn promotion, which in turn gives him the tempo for delivering checkmate or capturing Black Q!

Once you have understood the idea, the sequence of moves become clear.

1.

Kh7

h4

not 1. Kxg7

2.

Kg6

h3

3.

Kg5

h2

4.

Kg4

h1=Q

5.

Kg3

White wins with 6. Ra1+

But Black had a resource that would make White’s win extremely difficult. This comes out of an attempt to gain tempo as shown below!

4.

Kg4

g5

unblocks the a1-h8 diagonal

5.

Kg3

h1=N+

The under-promotion to Knight gains tempo for Black as White K has to move. White’s K and R against Black’s K and N gives difficult theoretical win for White.

The above is a study by Lasker but this type of Rook and Pawn ending may come up in actual play. So you should note in the following moves how White combines ‘opposition’ by his King and check by his Rook to push White King away from Black’s QBP while not allowing Black to give check along any row.